Dancing out of your comfort zone is more fun than stepping!

When I first heard about some teachers at my school planning to dance on stage for a Variety Show scholarship fundraiser, I chuckled.  They must be really talented, I thought.

After one of the first meetings a colleague spoke to me and encouraged me to join.  She insisted the moves weren’t difficult and that we would have so much fun. I said maybe.

The next week I arrived a few minutes earlier for work and joined a group of about 15 staff members in the cafeteria.  Music was blasting and everyone was watching our young assistant principal and following her moves. I left that first rehearsal smiling and actually feeling like I had exercised.  I had laughed and moved around a bit. It was fun.

For the next two weeks we met a little before school started and learned our routine.  We had 25 staff members volunteer to participate in this event.  I even went to the dress rehearsal at the high school the day before.

On the day of the performance, I showed my kindergarten students the video of the assistant principal demonstrating the dance moves.  My little kiddos helped me get the moves right.  We took a dance break during snack and practiced the routine. They all promised to come see me but I told them that if they couldn’t make it I’d be sure to show them the video next week.

 

Since my house is only one mile from the school where I work, I invited everyone back to my house for dinner.  Our lovely assistant principal treated to pizzas.  It was nice to have dinner here, and not at the school.  It was also a big step for me.  I have had family over, but I haven’t really hosted any other get togethers in my home since Mike passed.  It was nice to know I could still do it.

image

Well, we got to the high school in plenty of time.  In fact we waited in the sound proof orchestra room for over an hour before show time.  The butterflies in our bellies fluttered and we giggled as we took so many selfies of ourselves.

image

When our big moment arrived, they closed the curtains and we had to find our spots on stage in the dark.  Since we had never really assigned ourselves spots it was a bit tricky but it all worked out.  I actually remembered all the steps (the earlier practice had helped).  We laughed and had a blast.

Celebrating our debut out in town as a large dance group after the show was fun too.  I had time to catch up with some colleagues who I don’t always have time to visit with.  I’m glad I stepped out of my comfort zone and was encouraged to participate.  I may even sign up to do it again next year.

runawaywidow

At the age of 51 I unexpectedly became a widow. For the first 6 months after my husband died, I was in shock and numb. I journaled and with the help of friends, family and therapists was able to get back to living my old life, even if it is now very different. Before I was married, I had spent a semester in England and backpacked around Europe. My husband and I moved from New York to California for 8 years and started a family. Travelling took a back seat to raising a family and going to work everyday. Since the loss of my husband I have visited a lot of places with family and friends and took a solo trip to Thailand. I am enjoying sharing my stories and adventures as well as some of my insights to how I am traveling the path of being a widow. I hope to share my stories and adventures as well as some thoughts on being a middle aged widow. While I have some great experiences traveling to Thailand and cruising to Central America, some of my adventures involve a trip to see a Broadway show in nearby Manhattan and a shopping trip at Bed, Bath and Beyond. If I can inspire anyone to go out and continue to live a good life that would be my greatest accomplishment.

You may also like...

8 Responses

  1. Leslie says:

    It was so fun to step out of our comfort zone into the Fun Zone!! I was apprehensive too but so happy and fulfilled when we did the dance in front of a sold out crowd.

  2. Addie says:

    Sounds like fun, good exercise and a chance to get to know each other better I think you all should do it once a month followed by pizza of course!

  3. Sounds like great fun and I am so glad to hear you are moving out of your comfort zone. Take care.😊

  4. cedar51 says:

    It’s interesting that we don’t see the comfort zone moving – it comes from the far left rather than just being there, and sometimes we don’t even have time to say no, maybe your maybe but always it seems as if it is the right path to be on…even if it seems scary in the first instance.

    To make it even more interesting for you – was the fact that you were the closer home to the school so people didn’t have get home, eat dinner and then get back. And having pizza even better, nothing much to do except decide which flavour to munch on…

    My own comfort zone just got a bit jolted a few weeks ago when a chance chat with something to do with my forthcoming art-study…went in quite a different way to my expectations. Where I had been told a few years ago to “forget the idea you could specialise in photography…” now apparently I have a special gift – hand tremors etc…

    Which means I don’t have to study for years to obtain shaky art 🙂

    It has kind of thrown me, because I have tried so hard to overcome them darn problems and now I’m “allowed” to let them be…

Please let me know what you think...

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.

%d bloggers like this: